The Executive Director of the Perth Huron United Way says they are starting a new program called the Community Renewal Company.
Ryan Erb says the goal is to address the issues of affordable housing as well as the provision of social services in the two counties.
“We're trying to build an organization that has the capability to tackle large capital projects in our community by pulling together partners and revenue from lots of different angles to make it possible for us to have more affordable housing and social service hubs in the area,” said Erb. “The research led us to look at, potentially, eight locations where we might have housing projects across Perth and Huron and very, very high level business plans associated with those possibilities. We're soon going to be negotiating for land to begin, possibly over the next couple of years, building in various ways.”
On the social services side, it's making sure that organizations that are currently operating are not restricted to urban centres, like Goderich or Stratford.
Erb says they recognize that the population of both counties is spread out and many of the people living in the more remote communities don't have transportation, so they want to make sure that social services are available to those people.
